On Feb. 24, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh made a comment implying that foreign NGOs, in particular U.S. and Scandinavian ones, had a hand in the anti-nuclear protests largely peopled by local NGOs, activists, and fisherfolk in a small town in coastal South India.

Fair enough, perhaps even true. However, few days later, the government charged four Indian NGOs with using foreign funds towards the protests and their accounts were frozen by the Home Ministry. Read More »

Room to Read is active in nine countries and has distributed nearly 10 million books. Above, John Wood, founder of the NGO.

The Westin Hotel in a Mumbai suburb is advertized as the heart of Bollywood.

But on a recent evening at an event to raise money for a charity, there was to be none of that.

There was glitz, but not much glamor; bling, but only in a discreet way; and instead of paparazzi, only one photographer who politely asked you to stand against the green banner emblazoned with “Room to Read” — the charity for which the fundraiser had been organized. Read More »

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India Real Time offers analysis and insights into the broad range of developments in business, markets, the economy, politics, culture, sports, and entertainment that take place every single day in the world’s largest democracy. Regular posts from Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones Newswires reporters around the country provide a unique take on the main stories in the news, shed light on what else mattered and why, and give global readers a snapshot of what Indians have been talking about all week. You can contact the editors at indiarealtime(at)wsj(dot)com.